Amazon’s One-Hour Alcohol Delivery May Be a Headache for Startups

For on-demand alcohol startups, Amazon.com Inc .’s recent move into the one-hour booze-delivery business may be sobering.

As Amazon experiments in Washington–the only state in which it now holds a liquor license–and evaluates the complex patchwork of state and county regulations governing alcohol sales nationwide, more than a half-dozen alcohol delivery startups are working to differentiate themselves from one another and Amazon while wooing more physical retail stores to use their technology.